Swedish woman crashes train after taking it for a joyride

A Swedish cleaner stole a train and took it for a joyride before driving it
into an apartment building.

Crash investigators were at first mystified as to how and why the local commuting train crashed through the buffers at a siding in the outskirts of Stockholm in the early hours of Tuesday morning before ploughing into one of the kitchens of the building where five residents were asleep.

It later turned out that a cleaner had managed to start the train, which was unoccupied at the time, and take it for a spin.

(REUTERS/Jonas Ekstromer/Scanpix Sweden)

The train had reached such a speed that the front carriage managed to fly across and bridge a narrow road before slamming into the building, some 82 feet after the buffers.

The 20-year-old woman was trapped in the wreckage for two hours before being airlifted to hospital with what rescuers described as serious injuries. All those in the apartment block escaped unscathed.

"It is absolutely incredible that this was not a really serious accident both for the woman on the train and for those in the building," said Ulf Lindgren, from the Stockholm police. "They were all very lucky."

(REUTERS/Jonas Ekstromer/Scanpix Sweden)

Arriva, the railway company which owns the train, announced that it would try to establish just how the cleaner had managed to take the train.

"It was a cleaner who stole the train; somehow she managed to get into the cab and got the train moving," Tomas Hedenius, Arriva's communication's manager, told the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet. "We are now investigating how this was possible."

Police have charged the cleaner with endangering public safety, but her motives for taking the train remain unclear.

Managers from Stockholm Transport stressed that, despite the incident, it was almost impossible to steal a train and take it on an unauthorised journey.